Pretty In Pink?

"Pink isn't just a colour.  It's an attitude."

- Miley Cyrus

Now I wouldn't normally be found casually quoting the wise words of pop enfant and intellectual genius (what?), Miley Cyrus, but this time it does seem quite appropriate.  If you had asked me a few weeks ago whether I liked the colour pink, I probably would have replied "...." no wait, I wouldn't have replied at all.  Instead, assuming you were about to produce something pink to show me, I would have run like a mad man directly to the horizon and beyond. I mean, just think Barbara Cartland...

In fact, if I had stuck around to say anything, I probably would have declared that it was the most hideous colour on the planet and that I wouldn't be seen dead in, on or beside anything pink.  But oh, how wrong I was.  I'm not saying that pink is a gorgeous colour and should be celebrated for its adorable fluffiness, but rather that, as always happens when I say anything with any conviction and confidence, I am immediately proven totally wrong.  Again and again.

A few weeks ago a blogger friend of mine, Nordljusfollowyourstar, devoted some time to discussing her favourite colours, one of which was a bit pinkish, and I say "pinkish" because it immediately became apparent that saying "I don't like pink" was a bit like saying "I don't like buildings" when what you really mean is "I don't like 1960's brutalist concrete apartment blocks."  Of course, there are loads of buildings I like, and some which I absolutely adore.  I'm even sitting in one right now.  And in a similar vein, I quickly realised that right now I have 4 shirts in my wardrobe, that I wear on a regular basis, and that any normal person would immediately recognise as pink, so I could hardly say that I wouldn't be seen dead in pink.  And have you ever noticed that once you start thinking about something, it crops up absolutely everywhere?
I'm sure if I said right now "You don't see women with beehive hairdo's any more" I would then see four a day for the next two weeks.  And that's how it's been this week with the colour that looks like pink (and that's what I'll be calling it from now on.)  Now I haven't always had my camera with me so you'll just have to trust me when I say that the colour that looks like pink (CTLLP) was easily the most common colour everywhere I turned this week, and there was no subtlety about it.  It started on Tuesday when I needed to go to Exeter, my nearest city, for a 2-day training course.  Imagine my horror when this little sports car arrived to collect me.  I only had my phone to take a picture so it hasn't picked up the full effect of the thousands of tiny sparkles in the paint!  Worse still, I had drawn the short straw and had to sit in the back which was impossible to do without banging my head quite painfully, several times.  Yes, believe it or not there are seats in the back of this thing, and it feels like you're in a goldfish bowl or an astronaut's helmet - not too bad in the cool of the morning, but in the full sun of the afternoon... phew!  I remember being dropped off in the middle of the town at a bus stop where about 20 people were waiting for their evening bus home, all of whom had the small joy of seeing me bang my head once more on the way out, and one young girl saying "Look mum, it's a Barbie car!" 

I suppose I wouldn't have minded if it had been Penelope Pitstop's fiery little sports car

or Lady Penelope's Rolls Royce (and I wonder why they were both called Penelope..?)

but Barbie?!?  Sigh...

Anyway, while we are on the car subject, I had been keeping my eye out for one particular car that I had seen around town from time to time, but hadn't yet caught on film (what do we say now that we don't use film any more - "caught on sensor?")

Whatever.  As if by magic I found it parked in a lane behind my house a few days ago so, hoping that the driver wouldn't return in the next 5 minutes, I whizzed home to get my camera and grabbed this little shot.  I'm guessing that the driver got quite annoyed with people saying "Your car's got a pink roof" and rather than paint it a different colour, which would be my choice every time, they stencilled the correct name for the colour on the side.  Genius.

So what else have I seen this week to make my eyes cry in pain?  Well, any talk about the colour that looks like pink would be incomplete without the house that sits under the cliffs down at West Bay, which the owner has very thoughtfully just repainted for all the summer holidaymakers to enjoy and photograph, or cover their eyes and wish they had bought darker sunglasses.

And then there's the Bombay Nights Indian takeaway restaurant in nearby Dorchester, and I think they are missing a big marketing opportunity by not having a small fleet of similarly-coloured motorcycles to deliver their wares.

And then yesterday, as I was strolling around the Saturday market my eye was drawn to a whole stall of gifts for girls including these very girlie notebooks and even a garish leather-bound clock -
imagine the kitchen that that would look good in!







Even in our vintage quarter, which is definitely worth a visit if you're ever in Bridport, I spied through another car's windows this writing on a truck which just about encapsulated the whole spirit of this blog.

But the best I have saved to last - OK, so I didn't see it this week - they've long since changed the display, but at the time I couldn't resist taking a photo of this window display in one of the more expensive and exclusive gentlemen's stores in town.  Pink pants.

I don't even want to imagine a situation where those would be considered suitable underwear.




Let's finish this silly little journey through the world of the colour that looks like pink with a quote by the delightful Audrey Hepburn, and I hope she wouldn't mind too much if I alter the order of this to suit my purpose.

I believe that laughing is the best calorie burner. I believe in kissing, kissing a lot. I believe in being strong when everything seems to be going wrong. I believe that happy girls are the prettiest girls. I believe in manicures. I believe in overdressing. I believe in primping at leisure and wearing lipstick. I believe that tomorrow is another day, I believe in miracles. I believe in pink.

Of course, I believe in many of those things too, but I don't have to have them, do I?

Tyred Out!

I started writing, and intended to publish today's post yesterday morning, but it quickly became one of those incredibly frustrating days where, unlike King Midas, almost everything I touched turned to mud (trying to think of what the opposite of "gold" might be.)  I had a much needed day away from work which my mind and body had been pestering me about for some time.  I've been whizzing around Dorset and Devon quite a bit recently doing some rare paid photography work. I work for a charity organisation who provide advice and support for anybody affected by drug or alcohol problems, either individually or their friends and families.

Taking a break from my usual role of delivering workshops, group therapy and 1:1 support, they asked me to put my photography skills to use, and put together a portfolio of images they can use for promotions, advertising, training guides and their website. Of course I jumped at the chance to travel around the countryside, getting paid for my hobby, but I had no idea how tiring it would be. One day I spent a total of 7 hours on public transport for a total of 1 hour's photography. It's amazing how exhausting doing nothing but watching the beautiful countryside glide by can be.

Obviously it wouldn't be fair of me to post recognisable photos of any of the people involved, and frankly, most of the others shots are extremely boring, but it's all good experience. It's surprising how much of trying to be a good photographer has nothing to do with taking the pictures. Preparation and anticipation are incredibly important. How many people will there be? What props will be available? What sort of lighting will there be? What will the weather be doing? So many things that are out of your control, but that you must be prepared for. And then probably most important of all is the skill of people management, particularly if you're just using "ordinary" folk, rather than models or actors who are used to posing and looking relatively natural.  Telling people what to do is not something I'm naturally comfortable with, which is one of the many reasons why I'd never do wedding photography!

Anyway, ironically I hadn't planned on talking about any of that today, but as you may recall, at the beginning I said I had a day off. I had decided to finally get my bicycle fixed, having first thought about it back in December! I got the bike from a guy who recycles cycles further down the lane where I live, and it had a couple of problems, but full of confidence I said "Hey, don't worry about that - I'll fix it myself!"

For some reason, out of the ridiculous 21 gears, only 14 could be used.  Now if that was a car I wouldn't even dream that I knew how to fix it, but with a bike, particularly being able to see everything that's going on in plain sight, I find myself believing that I am suddenly a fully-qualified mechanic.

But I'm not!
I'm SO not!

Evey so often, throughout winter, I would get my bike out, undo lots of things, lay them out on the ground, scratch my head for a bit, then try to put them all back in the same order.  Usually I would try to fix a problem in one area only to find I had created another problem somewhere else, so I would strip it all down again then try to remember how it was when it only had the original problem.  Well, after several months of this madness I finally decided that I was not the genius mechanic I thought I was, and reluctantly went along to my local bike shop to see how much it would cost and how long I would be without a bike.  

"Ooh yes, Sir.  I see the problem.  That will cost about £10.  Can you pop back in ten minutes?"

"Why?"

"Well, to collect it, Sir."

"Can't I just leave it here until it's fixed?"

"That's what I mean, Sir.  It'll be fixed in ten minutes."

"Liar!"

Actually, I didn't say that last bit, but I really wanted to.  After all that time I could have just given it to this man/boy and had it back in less time than it would take to go and get a sandwich.  So, frustrated with myself at being too proud to admit defeat for all this time, I left it with him for rather more than 10 minutes and headed off to meet a friend for coffee.

Some time later I returned to the bike shop where I saw my bike looking happy with a shiny new label attached saying "completed."  However, when I went to pay, the young man/boy asked me if I realised how bad my tires were.  "Yes, I'd been wondering about that," I replied, I mean lied.  Of course I hadn't, but there was no need to bother him with more truths about my lack of mechanical skills.  "Since it's here already [and I have no idea what you're talking about] can you sort that out too?" I asked.

"Of course, Sir.  Can you come back after lunch?"

"That sounds fine. Thank you.  See you later."

So I headed back home to tackle my second goal of the day - to find out how to change my blog template so I could get bigger, sharper photos!

Now hopefully you can see that I have actually achieved that, or at least got the photos to be larger than the default size, but the result is massively insignificant compared to the crazy amount of time it took me to get there.  I lost count of the number of times I had to revert back to my original problem, or go back to photoshop to resize my images.  I tried 3 other blog templates which looked from their demos to have larger photos, but resolutely refused to do the same with my images.  Amazingly, no, "typically" it was not until the sun came up at 05:15 this morning that a flash of inspiration went off in my mind and the problem was solved in 1 minute.  Don't worry, I wasn't up all night working on it.  I finally got to bed, exhausted, at about 10:30 last night and fell asleep after just one page of my book, only for the dog to wake me at 05:00 at which point I had the inspirational moment of Googling "How can I change the image size in my blog?"  Doh!  Why didn't I think of that yesterday?

So, back to my bike...

Taking a break from my blog frustrations, I returned later that same day to collect my bike with its new problems fixed, and a bill that had now become more than the cost of the actual bike in the first place.  With a cheery wave and a ding-a-ling of my bell (yes, I really did!) I tootled off into the traffic to head home.  But wait!  What's this?  Where are all my new gears I had anticipated?

 It seemed that despite the big, shiny, new bill for parts and labour, and the time it had spent at the shop, absolutely nothing had changed to my original problem, so I turned around and headed back once more.  This time I had no friend to share a coffee with, and no hunger for a sandwich so I pottered around the shop pondering things like whether my dog would like to travel in a basket on my bike if I bought one, or should I get a pannier to attach on the back and go camping, or when am I ever going to do any of those things etc, etc.

Anyway, to not cut a long story short, they eventually got the original problem fixed, which they demonstrated to me in the shop, and I was able to return home for the third time that day to immerse myself in the bog of the blog.

BUT the story was still not complete!  2 hours later, and with the shops perilously close to closing for the day, I dragged myself away from my blog nightmare to put my bike away for the night - as much as I wanted to make the most of my new mobility and a day off, I was just simply too tired - and to my horror I saw my bike had a completely flat tire, and replacing the tires was one of those things that I hadn't ever intended to do until I was advised to by the man/boy in the shop!  Aaaaaaghhhh!!!!!  

Well, despite all my feelings of failure at my mechanical know-how, I could immediately see that a small valve wasn't as tight as it should be and that another part was actually missing, so I walked briskly back to the shop for at least the 4th time in one day to retrieve the missing part and tell them that they may be seeing me once more.  Getting back, I attached the missing part, tightened the valve and pumped the tire to its full capacity and Hey Presto! my bike is now fully working again!  YAY!!!  I fixed something myself and it only took 5 minutes.  Well, 6 months 8 hours and 5 minutes to be rather more precise, several of which were in the hands of someone else, but who's checking the details?  As far as anyone who doesn't read this will know, I fixed it all myself, while making a sandwich.

So, that's the end of yesterday's blog, and the end of a day that was probably more tiring (or should I say "tyring"?) than a day spent at work, but at least this morning I can now feel that it wasn't completely wasted.  And I haven't even talked about the builder who is going to be rebuilding my balcony and kitchen ceiling after a huge hole appeared and a torrent of rain came flooding through earlier in the week!  Thank heavens I only rent so won't have to pay for any of it, apart from the inconvenience.  Today, hopefully, will prove to be much more enjoyable.  Amidst the frustrations of blog writing yesterday, I treated myself to ordering a nice, new zoom lens for my camera which will make my candid street photography a little easier, and it has an image stabiliser which sounds very clever and useful.  That is supposed to arrive before 12:00 today, when I have been invited to attend the opening of a new garden commemorating the anniversary of the Hiroshima bombing, after which, weather permitting, I will be able to get some fun shots around the Saturday market.  Then tomorrow I'll be spending the afternoon down at the sea where the RNLI (Royal National Lifeboat Institution) are having a fundraising fun-day with hopefully lots of photo opportunities.

I'll end today with some good news that came out yesterday - I discovered a new talent on YouTube (well, new to me at least) - a young country music singer with an impossibly deep voice.  My musical tastes are pretty varied but I must admit to be a bit of a country fan.  You'll never catch me line dancing or barn dancing or Yee-Haa'ing all over the place, but you will definitely see some vigorous foot-tapping if you look hard enough.  So here's a bit of Josh Turner with a catchy little tune, "Why Don't We Just Dance?"

My Digital Canvas

Every once in a while I get the urge to dig out some paints, or a few sticks of pastels, and set about reminding myself why I am a photographer. I don't really remember much about painting or "colouring-in" from junior school (aged 5-10) so it probably wasn't making much of an impression on me at that age, when it might have been grabbing the attention of other future Van Goghs or Kandinskys or Pollocks.

I do remember making Easter chicks out of wool and cardboard discs, though only because there was clearly magic involved somewhere between the raw materials and the end result. I'm sure I wasn't in control of that little experiment at any time, but somehow it worked! And from secondary school onwards (11+) that's very much the way I have felt about those gifted people who make art from paint or pastels, chalk or charcoal or pens and pencils - there is magic going on somewhere, and I was absent from school the day the spells were taught.

From age 9 onwards, however, I was grabbed by the world of cameras and initially film. I could see something attractive or interesting in some way, I'd press a button, and a few days and a little pocket money later, I had my own miniature, 2D version in my hand. No mess, no inexplicable communication breakdown between my mind and my hand, and no feelings of being a complete and utter creative failure.

I went on to start the school's first ever photography club and built its first ever darkroom, and to complete the hat-trick of "things you weren't supposed to do at school" failed my final exams and went to college to study Media Arts & Technology instead of going to Oxford or Cambridge to read Latin and Classic Hungarian Literature of the 17th Century like all the other good little boys. (I did eventually find my way into University and out again with the appropriate scroll and silly hat, and on the way discovered many, many things I never want to do, but it was fun and I'd do it all again at the drop of that silly hat, but it had nothing to do with my real passion, photography.

Anyway, I digress. What I really wanted to say was that throughout all these little adventures and different directions I have always had that silent wish in the back of my mind to be able to produce a painting. With age and experience I realise that a painting doesn't have to look like one of the grand master's to be art, and that I might be able to get away with a limited ability as long as my intention and message was strong, but I also realise that I'm not too concerned about "spreading a message" or "challenging beliefs" on canvas. Purely and simply, I actually do want to produce something that looks like it was painted by a master, but is relevant to my life, and the things I see.

And that is where digital photography raises its hand and shouts "Me! Me! Me! I can do that!" from the back of the classroom. I remember the first time I got a copy of Photoshop Elements (it didn't even have a version number in those days) and saw with no little excitement things called "Paint Daubs", "Rough Pastels" and "Watercolor". I also remember, 5 minutes later, the feelings of total disappointment to discover that they didn't match up to my hopes at all, and in fact it was sometimes hard to tell afterwards which filter I had used.
A couple of years later, when I got a copy of Photoshop CS2, I half assumed, half hoped that there would have been big strides in the realism of these features, but sadly no.

A few actions have also made their way through to my desktop, most notably a set by Mike Finn - I think I was drawn by the name rather than the action, if I'm perfectly honest, but it still produces some acceptable results, though still not meeting my needs.

Around about the same time, there were a number of photographers on Flickr who were experimenting with layered textures to various degrees of success.

This was a completely different approach to a common theme, and was one of those huge advances that comes about from time to time that totally transformed the world of photography, and it is still progressing a-pace now. The thought of taking a perfectly lovely photograph and slapping over the top of it a photograph of mud or cracked and broken concrete seemed ridiculous as an idea, but with a little experimentation of blending styles and contrasts the end result somehow looked as if it had been crafted with a thickly oiled brush on a heavy, ancient canvas.

I'll talk a lot more about my journey through texture work in future blogs, I'm sure, but before I lose your interest, and forget the point of THIS blog, I would like to tell you of a new landmark in digital photographic manipulation. At least I think so. I discovered it by chance, mentioned on a Red Bubble site by a talented photographer, Elaine Teague whose work I have been admiring for a while now, and it's called Dynamic Auto Painter.

I love it!

All of the photos in this blog entry have been produced with a very rudimentary understanding of the program. I have only downloaded the free version (it's not hard to get around the watermark problem!) and have probably used it for less than 2 hours so far due to some hectic photography jobs I've been working on this last week, but I'm just loving every minute of it. I think it uses the principle of the Art History Brush available on Photoshop which I find quite tricky to get to grips with, in that while it seems to be painting step by step onto a canvas, in reality it is revealing step by step a number of images layered underneath. One of the truly great things about D.A.P. is that you are not left waiting and waiting, staring at an unmoving screen, watching an egg timer occasionally revolve, before finally being presented with either a rubbish image that just gets you angry for having wasted your time, or telling you that it can't perform this operation due to total memory failure, or something.

No, none of that. With D.A.P. you get to see your painting evolve at every step, at whatever speed and detail you choose. You can use your mouse to concentrate the processing on specific areas if you wish, and stop the whole procedure at any time. Like real life, if you set the mode to "continuous" the painting will never stop.There are so many preset styles to choose from including wax crayons, watercolour, oils etc and variable degrees of impressionism, surrealism and palettes to mess about with. I'll be honest, I'm having as much fun watching it do it's stuff as I am with the finished result. It's got that magic that always had me spellbound as a child, and still does as a grown-up, and I can see it happening on my own photos. What fun!

I don't know how much longer this love affair will last, and obviously I'd love to find out exactly how it is doing it so that I can do it all by myself, but for the moment I'm thoroughly enjoying messing about, without any of the mess. This, coupled with a liberal dose of cracked concrete texture layer and I fully expect to be exhibiting in Tate Modern this time next year.

Now, about those wooly chicks.....

Some Time In Lyme

I've been living in this little corner of England for over three years now, but only visited the nearby town of Lyme Regis a handful of times. Worse still, I've only ever really walked along the promenade and round the harbour.

It's quite a pretty harbour and town centre, but much of this is lost under the stampede of summer tourists. With this in mind, last month I set off to explore the back streets, the paths less travelled. In the end I'm sure I only just scratched under the surface, but I was so pleasantly surprised by the curious little corners, the meandering and quirky walkways and the hickledy-pickledy houses and cottages that I'll definitely return for another dose.

One of the first of my little discoveries was this old post box mounted into the wall. On the wall above was a little blue plaque - I'm a sucker for these and often risk life and limb crossing busy roads just for that little thrill of knowing I might be walking in the footsteps of historic giants. Sadly this time there was no mention that a famous person was born here, or died near here, or even just paused for thought somewhere close by, but it did tell me that this was one of the oldest post boxes in the country dating back at least as far as 1799 - long before we started liberally adorning them in bright, shiny, red paint. In fact, at that time it was more usual for people to gather in the street, or at least send their children into the street waiting for the daily, or even weekly mail coach. And today we complain if our broadband speed fails to deliver an email within 20 seconds.

It was a pity that the yellow lines ran along this road, making it just that bit harder to imagine a mail coach bouncing along this lane, although I have since read that this is in fact the oldest street in the whole town. Now bearing in mind that the town was considered so important that King Edward I granted it a royal charter as far back as 1284, and indeed it was mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086, that must make this little lane easily over a thousand years old.

Clearly the designs of the houses did not date back anywhere near that far, but there was still a marvellous uniqueness to each and every one, a trait so often lost in modern towns and cities with their anonymous plate glass windows, and repetitive greyness as far as the eye can see. Here in Lyme it was as if the whole town had got together in the town hall one evening and decided between them who was to have which colour paint to brighten their house.

Standing in a little gated garden I couldn't decide whether the widest variety of colour was among the flowers or indeed the buildings surrounding them. And it wasn't just the colours that changed with every step, but the styles of building and their purpose.

Along a row of what initially appeared to be traditional Georgian houses, there would randomly appear a bakery, or an art gallery and with very little announcement a museum of fossils boldly named Dinosaurland!

Lyme Regis, for those who have not visited, is another town along Dorset's Jurassic Coast, 95 miles of rocks and cliffs afforded World Heritage status, alongside such greats as The Grand Canyon. Almost every stride along the beaches, particularly nearer Lyme, you are likely to be walking on fossils of sea creatures 150-200 million years old. Many will be no larger than a coin, but occasionally true giants are discovered that previously we might only have guessed at in films.

Anyway, as tempting as it was to dart into the museum, I remained true to my promise and strolled on through the back streets of Lyme.

It's only now, when I look up on Google Maps the names of the streets, that I realise just how little of this remarkable town I wandered around. I may have just been lucky finding the only hidden corner of town to have so many diverse little charms, but I somehow doubt it.

Around another corner, at the junction of Coombe Street and Sherbourne Lane if you happen to be in the area, I discovered one of those more traditional, scarlet post boxes tucked neatly into the wall of a bridge.

I've no doubt the bridge is considerably the older, but it was pleasing to see that the addition of the more modern post box did nothing to detract from beauty of the old stone.

And there, from that bridge, I found the most unexpected sight of the day, and it wasn't the little family of ducklings frantically chasing around after their mum. Rather it was a scene that could easily have been taken from a hillside village in Provence. A rocky, drying river flowing under the road and beside tall, colourfully-shuttered houses, weaving its quiet way, almost unnoticed, through the back streets and houses of Lyme Regis. But running parallel to this river, and about 4 metres higher, was another little stream.

It ran almost touching the front doors of the houses lined along this miniature valley. Indeed, each house had their own little stone bridge crossing this small stream to their front doors from the pedestrian path that divided the rivers. It was utterly charming in so many ways, but not least of which because I was almost the only person there to enjoy it.

I'm sure there is plenty more to explore of the town, but for now I'll leave that for the summer tourists and the kids who will shortly be running free from their schools, but already I'm determined and eagerly looking forward to another day of discovery in the autumn.

In my next blog, I'll talk about the photography and digital painting styles I've used here.

And The Band Played On

Every so often, on a Saturday morning, a brightly coloured marching band invades our town and takes over the curiously-named Bucky-Doo Square to entertain and amuse the weekend shoppers. I've noticed it's not always the same band, according to the sashes and emblems that adorn their uniforms and instruments and this puzzles me somewhat. Firstly, if memory serves correctly, just about every town I've ever lived in has had at least 1 brass band, not including all the junior military bands that appear out of the woodwork for the occasional group march to a church, or in front of a float at carnival time. And secondly, try as I might, I can't really say with any conviction that there is anything noticeably different between them all, either in the way they look or indeed, what they play.

Now I'm sure if you are one of those who make up these fine traditions, that you will vehemently defend your band as one which plays new, modern songs, rather than the same old, weary tunes that they've been playing for 100 years, but why is it that I always hear the same ones? For the life of me I can't recall anything more modern than The Beatles or an Elvis tune, or to put it another way, anything that was written in my lifetime, and technically-speaking, I'm old enough to be a grandfather without anyone breaking any laws.

So why do these bands have to tour? Why does our band travel halfway across the country to someone else's town square while their local band travels the opposite journey to perform more or less the same repertoire, on the same instruments in ours? So far as I know, and please correct me if you know otherwise, there are not sufficient atmospheric differences to make "It's A Long Way To Tipperary" sound refreshingly different if performed 50 miles away. Similarly, if there are vastly different ways to play Colonel Bogey on a xylophone, then I can't pick them out.

And while we're on the subject, just because "Hound Dog" was a hit for The King, it doesn't mean it automatically translates to the military band with the same foot-tapping, rock and roll beat. Instead it sounds like something you would hear from a cheap electric keyboard on demo mode.

Having said all that, each Saturday I make my way, with camera, up to the town square with a little bit of hope that one of these bands might have decided to gather for our amusement, and there is often an equal sense of disappointment when all I see are a couple of tables of random, second-hand, let's be honest, junk being sold in the hope of buying a tiny primary school in a village I've never heard of a new set of colouring pens.

As you can probably guess by now, I am not eagerly rushing to the square to listen to the band, but rather to photograph them. They really are a photographer's dream when it comes to human subjects that can't move, hide, argue or object in any way, and with the added bonus of shiny, reflective musical instruments (which are always, always good in a photo) and brightly-coloured uniforms cleaned and pressed to within an inch of their military lives. Most of the time, when walking through the town with my camera, I feel I'm about to be arrested at any moment for accidentally taking a photo of someone's feet without written permission obtained three weeks in advance. But this will never happen with the band. In fact, the absolute worst that happens is that with just a cheery grin and a raising of the eyebrows (I don't actually know what sentiment I'm conveying with either of these actions) I reach an unspoken agreement that I can take as many photos as I like provided I've put £1 in their collection tin. Now that's got to be a bargain.

On this particular Saturday we had a band with a conductor determined to provide us more than the usual entertainment for our money. Whether that was because the Mayor (accompanied by numerous admiring ladies) had slipped almost unnoticed into the crowd of onlookers it's hard to say, but I suspect not.

Military bands do not usually lend themselves to much audience participation, I suppose mainly because most people do not take their tubas or glickenspiels in their pockets when they go shopping, but this guy took even that to the next level by allowing members of the public to actually conduct the band. Now, whether or not conductors are really needed to keep well-trained musicians in time is a topic for another post entirely, but you can't deny there is a little risk in handing over "control" to someone who may have just strolled out of a nearby pub after a thoroughly enjoyable liquid lunch. But in this case it worked a treat. Somehow, of all the people he could have chosen to hand the baton to, he picked the one person who you felt had lived their entire life waiting for just this moment to let her rhythmic energy loose. She took to it with such enthusiasm and passion it was a miracle she didn't take someone's eye out. Even the trumpet players, whose eyes always appear to be on the point of bursting free from their sockets, somehow managed to open them wider still and raise their eyebrows to yet another impossible level. It really was the icing on a musical cake.

Maybe one day I might have the confidence to travel with one of these bands, as their unofficial/ official photographer, to try and discover and document why on earth they swap towns with other, seemingly identical bands, but for now I thank them for making the effort, for entertaining us in the face of my cinicism, and allowing me a few different faces in which to poke my lens. Plus, whether I like it or not, I must say the uncontrollable tapping must have been good exercise for my foot.

Day One - A Blog Begins

For some years now I have been posting photos to Flickr, predominantly as a way of getting my photography into the public eye at zero cost. But something has always been missing. There always seems to be something more interesting in the stories behind the photos, the fascinating and curious people I come across while looking for my next shot, or maybe something a little more personal in why I was hanging bananas on a washing line, or trying to take a close up photo of my own nose.

So that's what this little blogette is all about. Hopefully you'll get to see some photos you may like, but mostly it's about the stories that surround them. I can't pretend that they will all be stories that will curl your toes, or make your belly ache with laughter, but hopefully they'll be just about interesting enough to make you pop back from time to time, and maybe say "Hi."

Oh, and if you should ever want to buy a copy of my photos, well that would be a lovely little bonus too. Just get in touch.